#blottr

Blottr is the world's leading eyewitness news network, with more than half a million contributors and 200 news clients globally.

Partnering with YouTube, the worlds largest video platform, Blottr are managing the rights to social video content to surface, verify and distribute video it believes has the highest likelihood of generating significant volumes of views and engagement.

Blottr work closely with brands to help them become powerful content creators and publishers.

New Post has been published on http://projectopenhand.biz/with-a-revenue-model-in-sight-crowdsourced-news-service-blottr-raises-612k-for-its-content-syndication-platform-newspoint/2193

With A Revenue Model In Sight, Crowdsourced News Service Blottr Raises $612K For Its Content Syndication Platform NewsPoint

Blottr, the crowd-sourced (or citizen journalism) news service, has raised an additional £400,000 (~$ 612k) to help scale NewsPoint, its syndication platform that lets publishers/broadcaster purchase user-submited content to help power their web sites and news rooms. It brings the total raised by the London, UK-headquartered company to £1.4 million ($ 2.1m). This latest round was led by Kima Ventures, while existing investor Playfair Capital also participated.

Launched in late 2012, NewsPoint is described as a web-based platform to provide editors and newsrooms with “unique” footage (video, photographs and text), captured and reported in real-time by people on the ground — content that is provided by existing Blottr contributors. Subscribers to the paid-for service get between 3-10 new stories a day. It currently targets three categories of content: Middle East, Global News, and Breaking News; the latter gives a 1 hour head start before the same content begins showing up on the wider NewsPoint network.

The B2B expansion to Blottr’s otherwise consumer-facing offering goes some way to answering the question: what’s the business model for crowdsourced news? Founder Adam Baker is candid about the challenge that Blottr faced finding a revenue model that is sustainable beyond the limits of selling advertising alone.

In a statement he says: “Until late 2012 we had been focused on developing our authentication technology and global contributor network, which today uniquely differentiates us and provides significant competitive advantages. We made considerable noise and generated strong traffic numbers, yet like many startups, struggled to find the business model behind it”.

Eight weeks since launching, NewsPoint already claims mainstream media clients such as Channel 4, ITN, Fox News, and Sky News, helping NewsPoint syndicated content reach an audience of around 200m. Interestingly, however, for the time being at least, contributors don’t get a cut of any licensing fees, but this is something Blottr is said to be exploring.

At Blottr we're passionate about democratising news and exposing footage from around the world that would otherwise remain unreported.

It is a hugely rewarding and interesting mission which, for 2 years now, has led Blottr to break major global news before anyone else.

Today, we are working with some of the world's most recognisable and respected news organisations, providing them with unique, raw footage from the scene of events around the world.

Blottr's small, talented London-based team needs some support.

We're looking for super smart, educated graduates with a background in either journalism or social media to join the team for a period of 6 months.

Two of our editorial team joined us as interns and we loved each other so much, they're both now hugely valuable members of our team.

You'll need to be creative, entrepreneurial, hard working, flexible and passionate about current affairs.

We will train and show you lots about crowd sourced journalism, sourcing content, verification, building networks, social media monitoring and what running and working within a startup company looks like.

Unlike most internships, you'll be deeply involved in our business and projects, making a significant contribution. We don't need paper filers or pen pushers, so expect hard work.

If you are interested, email our editor Ravin Sampat with your resume and a few paragraphs as to why we should hire you. Ravin's email is [email protected]

Some people think that Ian Beale is only interested in making money, running a successful cafe and catering business, and growing sweet, sweet moustaches.

Bob Dylan turns 71 today. And to celebrate that let's list our favourite Dylan songs!

Like A Rolling Stone

Mr Tambourine Man

Don't Think Twice, It's Alright

Bob Dylan & Eric Clapton - Don't Think Twice... by diapaata

I Want You

London-based citizen journalism start-up Blottr, which destealthed towards the end of February with a Techrunch write-up and recently announced a round of angel funding, led the news agenda for much of Monday by breaking the day's major UK news story. 

First publishing a few minutes after 10am, Blottr broke the news of a bomb alert in London and over the day added pictures, detail and coverage of the events in the square and the controlled explosion carried out in Trafalgar Square around 9am. Sky and the BBC picked up the story around 3 hours later, and Blottr founder Adam Baker told virtualeconomics: